Neobehaviorism and Second Language Acquisition

Neobehaviorism and Second Language Acquisition

1. Three general principles

   • the principle of shaping which mentions that learning will be rapid and smooth if the complex behaviors are broken into smaller units and are learnt bit by bit.
   • The law of effect which places importance on reinforcing the correct or native like response and on correcting the non-native like responses.
   • The law of exercise which indicates that language learning is promoted if the learner repeats the responses to the stimuli.
   • Behaviorism

2. New behaviorism

   • Neo-behaviorists acknowledge that operant and classical conditioning together do not completely determine behaviors.
   • Clark Hull was the first behaviorist who recognized the importance of learner’s internal characteristics such as motivation.
     • • Organism’s drive: An internal state of arousal that motivates its behavior
     • Stimulus intensity: An intense stimulus bringing about a stronger response than a weak stimulus.
     • • Incentive: The amount and immediacy of reward All of the above factors work together to increase the likelihood and relative strength of a particular response.

3. Connectionism and new behaviorism

   • Connectionism is a cognitive framework for explaining learning processes
   • In connectionism, knowledge is assumed to be distributed between neural connections and learning consists of reinforcing certain types of connection.

4. Competition model and new behaviorism

   • The basic claims of competition model is that cues such as stress, intonation, rhythm, morphological marking, and word order are available in input and language processing involves competition among these cues.

5. Educational implications of new behaviorism

   • classical behaviorism focused only on the external manipulation of the organism, the development of cognitive science led to a stronger awareness of the importance of internal as well as external behaviors
   • Neo-behaviorists recognized the importance of learners’ internal characteristics, such as personality, motivation and habit.

6. New behaviorism and language assessment

   • One of the applications of new behaviorism is in concerning the assessment. It is commonly held that effective assessment tasks should test the performance of behaviors stated in learning outcomes under the same conditions as those under which they were learnt
   • Behaviorist principles are useful as part of formative assessment, which is a kind of assessment designed to provide feedback for the learner and teacher, rather than to record or certify achievement.
   • Formative assessment may be seen as a form of reinforcement, designed to motivate and encourage learners. To be effective, the reinforcement of desired behavior must be provided consistently and in a timely manner so that the correct response is reinforced. When it comes to assessment, therefore, learners should receive feedback as quickly as possible after the assessment task